Australia’s spin future in a league of its own

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By Brett McKay, 12 Oct 2009 Brett McKay is a Roar Expert

Tagged:: Cricket, Cricket Australia, Futures League, spin bowling

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Australia's Nathan Hauritz appeals unsuccessfully for the wicket of England's Paul Collingwood during the final day of the first cricket test match between England and Australia in Cardiff, Wales, Sunday, July 12, 2009. AP Photo/Tom Hevezi

At the beginning of October, Cricket Australia announced that the old state second XI competition would be replaced by a new Under-23 competition focussing on the development of spin bowlers. What was formerly known as the CA Cup would henceforth be known as the Futures League.

The Futures League will promote aggressive cricket by default, with measures in place to encourage attacking declarations in the three-day matches. Teams will only be able to bat for 96 overs (with no new ball available) in the first innings, and only 144 overs in total. Further, an outright win will earn more points than in previous years.

Each team will be allowed to field three “over age” players, which makes the decision to label each side as an Under-23 team (instead of the former 2nd XI tags) a bit curious.

The announcement itself was met with both enthusiasm and scepticism in some quarters, including on The Roar.

While most agreed that development of spin bowlers in Australia had got to the point of being a no-brainer, the concern was that the awarding of bonus points for wickets taken by young spinners might create some kind of false economy, given that Sheffield Shield and Test captains are not operating under the same system.

A financially-minded team-mate and I were discussing this very topic at cricket training the other day. Can the Futures League actually develop young spinners and maintain a genuine second tier of state cricket in Australia?

Well, with the benefit of an extra week to ponder this, and in which the first round of Futures League matches happened to be played, I can happily report that the answer is ‘yes’.

The three fixtures completed around the country last week all had a common element: young spinners getting extended spells, plenty of wickets among them, and some positive signs for the future.

The standout performances from the tweakers came from South Australian leg-spinner Cullen Bailey, and Tasmanian off-spinner Wade Irvine.

Bailey is a name known to plenty of domestic cricket followers. He and one-Test off-spinner Dan Cullen burst onto the scene in their late teens, and at the time, both were predicted to have long futures in Australian cricket ahead of them, at both state and international level.

Unfortunately, both struggled after early success, and it got to the point where South Australia went into Sheffield Shield games last season without a recognised spinner.

Both managed to hold onto state contracts for this season, but it may have been a close-run thing with off-spinning all-rounder Aaron O’Brien arriving in Adelaide from New South Wales.

Bailey, to his great credit, has started off the 2009/2010 season in the best possible way, taking eleven wickets in a high-scoring match against the Victorian Under-23s in Adelaide.

Despite SA losing by two wickets in the end, Bailey took 4 wickets in Victoria’s first innings and followed up with 7 of the 8 wickets to fall in the second dig.

With Victoria scoring at better than a run-a-ball in their second innings, it’s worth noting that 6 of Bailey’s 7 wickets were either caught-and-bowled, stumped, bowled or lbw. However aggressive the batting, any Australian leggie taking 11 wickets in a match is going to get noticed.

Rookie all-rounder Irvine, who doubles as an opening batsman for Tasmania’s Under-23s, made up for a mixed time with the bat by finishing with 7 wickets for the match against Western Australia in Perth.

Two first innings wickets were followed by 5/103 in the second innings for the young off-spinner, and helped knock WA over for 264, which in turn allowed Tasmania to chase 186 for their six wicket win.

As with Bailey, 4 of Irvine’s 7 wickets were on the pitch itself, either bowled, caught-and-bowled, or caught behind.

Both Bailey and Irvine have now been included in their respective state’s 13-man Sheffield Shield squads, with SA hosting Tasmania from Tuesday. If included in the final XIs, it would mark a continued re-emergence for Bailey, while for Irvine it will be a welcome First Class Debut. No doubt both will be sweating on the Adelaide Oval pitch necessitating a second spinner.

There were plenty of other young spinners throwing their name up too. Luke Mangan took 4 wickets with his leg-breaks for WA against Tasmania, while in Brisbane Cameron Boyce’s leggies netted him three wickets against the ACT.

I was interested to read while looking through scorecards and profiles that former Australian spinner Ashley Mallet described 20 year-old Boyce as “the best spinner in Australia not in first-class cricket” back in 2007/08, so it will be interesting to track his progress in this competition.

Queensland hasn’t really had a regular First Class spinner since Nathan Hauritz emerged years ago, so the opportunity is certainly there.

One other concern about the Futures League’s emphasis on spin bowling for me was how these young spinners would be captained.

Fortunately this concern might have been a touch premature too, as most of the spinners used were given lengthy spells, with some coming into the attack quite early.

The other plus than I can see is that three sides went into their games with a captain also under 23, with WA’s captain is still only 24.

In my mind, this means we’re not only developing young spinners, we’re also developing the next generation of state captains. Traditionally, the second XIs were captained by more experienced fringe First Class players, and so once past the under-age rep teams there wasn’t a lot of opportunity for young captains to keep leading teams.

This move to the Futures League and the encouragement of spin bowlers is a good one in my humble opinion, and I can see no reason why the new competition won’t achieve its main goals.

Cricket supporters are often quick to scold CA, but in this case we should be giving them credit for a move that actively promotes the future of Australian spin-bowling.

Follow Brett McKay on Twitter: @BMcSport

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The Crowd Says (25) | Page 1 of Comments

Spiro Zavos said | October 12th 2009 @ 8:16am | Report comment

Well I’ve been ‘quick to scald’ the Cricket Australia from time to time for arrogance bordering on the incompetent with the selection and supervision, for instance, of the selectors of the national cricket team. But if this interesting report is on the money, then something has been done right to bring in an era of good spin bowlers.
But it has to be remembered that someone like Shane Warne, a spinning wicket-taker who also was as accurate and run-saving as any tight medium-pacer, represents a rare case in Australian cricket. Tight, wicket-taking leg-spinners of genuine class, Test match winners started with the New Zealand-born Clarrie Grimmett, then Richie Benaud and the best of them, Warne.
I’ve left out Bill O’Reilly, the greatest bowler Bradman said he’d faced, as he was fast enough to often open the bowling and mainly bowled top-spinners with two men perched near the batsman’s legs for the bat-pad catch.
The heavy bats, shorter boundaries and the prevalence of shorter forms of cricket have conspired against the rise of eg-spinners, particularly. Because of this I’m not too worried about the number of the generally more accurate and tighter finger-spinners being looked at, including Jon Holland, who is a tall chap and gets the ball above the eye-line and exerts a fair bit of turn.

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Brett McKay said | October 12th 2009 @ 8:47am | Report comment

Spiro, we’ve all scalded CA at some point in time, especially recently! But as I ssid here, I think they’re onto something with the Futures League. Also as mentioned, I’m very glad to see young captains developing too.

It’s interesting you mention Warne being a rare case, which of course he is. I’ve said on these forums on many occasions that Warne and MacGill are quite possibly the best and worst thing to happen to young spinners in Australia. Best for the obvious reasons, but worst because now every young spinner – especially young leggies – are expected to turn it square while conceeding no more than two an over. That attacking and containing ability may not materialise again in my lifetime, yet we expect this of 15 year olds now.

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SouthernWaratah said | October 12th 2009 @ 11:02am | Report comment

Great insight Brett! Thanks for doing this article as I had no Idea what was happening around the country since this started.

A couple of point to note to Spinners in Australia.

1. Great spinners don’t seam to dominate at State level in Australia. Warne famously had limited success at Shield Cricket. G.Matthews would have to be the only cricketer of the last 20 to say he dominated at Shield level(?) The West Australians use to tremble at the crease with Mo running in from the Randwick end. (He owned that end of the SCG and there needs to be some sort of recognition to his contribution to state cricket for me with a stand of at least a bar named after him at the SCG.)
2. All this spinning promotion at the under 23 level means that we also have batsman facing a lot of spin bowling. Combine this to this the amount of cricket we will be playing against India in the next 20 years & this can only be a good thing.

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Brett McKay said | October 12th 2009 @ 11:22am | Report comment

SouthTah, I’m glad you enjoyed it. Truth be told, while I knew about the revamp of the CA Cup, I didn’t realise the comp had started until last week when I realised a couple of guys from my club were in Brisbane with the ACT side.

Your couple of points are very valid too, and I’m sure GRJ Matthews would be the first to support your push for a bar at the SCG to be named after him. I love that at almost 50, he still thinks (or did, until recently) he’s the best spinner in NSW!

You could take your second point even further actually. Whereas once our youth teams toured England religiously, in the last few years the young squads have toured India and the subcontininent almost exclusively. The U15 side are just back from a 10-day tour to India, and the U19s have just wrapped up a series against Sri Lanka (in Darwin, admittedly).

So where once the tradtional development for a young Australian player was to make rep squads and then maybe have a couple of seasons in English leagues and county 2nd XIs, now they’re getting extra exposure to subcontininental teams and conditions too. And then there’s the IPL as well, for the best of them. You’re right, all this can only be a good thing…

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vinay verma said | October 12th 2009 @ 11:36am | Report comment

Excellent article Brett and I am glad the focus is on real cricket for a change. Good on CA..but why stop here….Bedi nd Prasanna should be invited to come over for a short stint and teach Bailey andCullen the mentality of Spin Bowling..the art of stategy, the use of the crease ,change of pace and attitude. Abdul Qadir has had spells in Melbourne and I am sure could be interested.
Spin Bowling is a culture and exists more in NSW than anywhere else. There is a fallacy that sees spinners given the ball when it is old. Spinners like a newish ball as this gives more bounce…Captains should try spiners a lot earlier..

Good signs but as I say dont stop here.

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Brett McKay said | October 12th 2009 @ 12:09pm | Report comment

Thanks Vinay, nice to have your agreement for a change!! (I do jest..) As far as I was aware, CA have employed one SK Warne to do exactly what you speak of – work with young spinners about the mental side of things, and more importantly, to work with young captains (and even old captains) on how best to use spin bowlers.

Cullen Bailey was brought on first change in the second innings against Victoria, so there’s good signs. And you’re right, this should remain a key program, not just a five year plan…

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vinay verma said | October 12th 2009 @ 12:26pm | Report comment

Shane Warne was one of a kind and emulating him is difficult..great players seldom make good coaches..Kapil Dev and Viv Richards are prime examples..Genius is hard to bottle and harder still to convey..what is commonplace for the greats is a mountain too high for most…
Warne will certainly help but you need more time than Warne is spending with them…If Warne could spend a whole season mentoring these kids we would get somewhere..not flying visits
Isee Kersi wrote about a young Indian bowler theother day..the irony was he is a fast bowler…Come In Indian Spinner!

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Freud of Football said | October 12th 2009 @ 5:05pm | Report comment

It’s interesting to see that we are all roundly praising the idea of giving up-and-coming spinners a leg up in the cricket world but isn’t that a little narrow-minded? Don’t get me wrong, a junior league of sorts is a fantastic idea and one I am very very happy to read about and if the South Aussies spinners are able to use it to regain places in the first XI then that alone will have been worth it. However it seems we are a little nostalgic for the good old days where Warne was tearing teams apart, then heaven forbid he got injured or did something stupid and we had MacGill, yes STUART MACGILL! as backup.

The point has already been made that such talent is rare and comes only every generation or so and hence building a league that is focused on developing talent that doesn’t exist at the moment seems a little silly although as the name implies, perhaps “future” minded. However I can’t imagine the sole purpose behind it is to improve spin-bowling, of course young players will face more spin-bowling which will be advantageous for their development and I like your point about the captaincy Brett, an important point which shouldn’t be underestimated but look at Hughes for example, his problem is with the short ball, something a lot of young Aussies have had over the last decade. At the height of the Windies power their batsmen were fantastic playing the short ball because they practiced against top quality fast bowlers.

My point being we can’t look to develop a team like India, excellent against spin but with a few weak points against the seamers because SAF and Pakistan will continue to churn out excellent quick bowlers.

I for one though would like to see more tours for the younger guys, get them some good experience on the sub-continent before they make that step up to international level. It would be worth it for CA to look at a feeder-club type system with some of the Indian and South African domestic teams allowing the best Aussie players (not just spinners) to go and play abroad for a season – even if this costs us money, the development will be worth it in the long term.

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Brett McKay said | October 12th 2009 @ 7:59pm | Report comment

Freud, you’ve raised a similar question to a mate of mine today, who without having seen any scorecards from last weeks games wondered if the promotion and encouragement of young spinners was going to be to the detriment of young quicks. He also wondered if Australia were perhaps a little preoccupied with following India, with his fear being that in ten years time we’ll have a thousand spinners and five quicks.

I’ll say the same thing to you as I did him: Australia doesn’t and won’t ever have the pitches to produce an endless line of spinners. None of the teams last week played any more than two spinners, and a couple had only one. The post Warne and MacGill years have proven that even in boom times, Australia’s spin well hasn’t been that deep. The rejig of the old 2nd XI comp to actively promote young players, but young spinners especially is a really good idea, and hence the forward look of the article. It’s natural that when we try to look forward we end up looking back at Warne and co, but the truth is we’ll never see another Warne in my liftime, and probably not in my kids lifetime either. I’m kidless, by the way.

I mentioned in a post above that tours to the subcontinent are becoming much more commonplace in the younger rep sides, and that’s a very good thing. Australia A also seem to be playing more and more series now, and the selection of Jon Holland for the ODI tour to India comes directly from the A series against Pakistan.

The Futures League is a positive move, not just for the development of young spinners – despite that being a major focus – but for all young players. I’m glad you picked up on the young captains point too, because I think that’s almost as important as developing young spinners. You only have to ask who should replace or succeed Ponting to know that there isn’t necessarily any standout candidates. We need to get back to the situation when Mark Taylor retired, and there were three genuinely good options (S.Waugh, Healy, and Warne).

It’ll be interesting to track these young guys through the summer..

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- Freud of Football said | October 12th 2009 @ 10:03pm | Report comment
  
  You’re right Brett, Australia’s pitches aren’t especially suited to spinners although if you were to look at the major grounds, you’d have to say the SCG, MCG and Adelaide oval are better for spin than pace, the WACA and the Gabba are obviously good for pace and Hobart is more-or-less just for batting. However we shouldn’t be moulding our future generations on the basis of how our pitches play, we should harness whatever talent we have ala Slater, he was good at playing aggressively so let him do so.
  
  Australia has always produced good-to-great fast bowlers and will continue to do so into the future, spinners will only come sporadically. As Vinay mentioned, we should focus on getting some good coaching in for them rather than tweaking competitions to give them more chances. Further, you need 3/4 quicks and a spinner for a “balanced” lineup and more teams have had success without a good spin option than without good pace options, the Windies being the prime example.
  
  I think we should focus on both aspects, we can’t force talent which isn’t there.
  
  Australia will however continue to churn out batsmen like they’re going out of fashion, perhaps we should look at harnessing the bowling talents of some good batsmen, someone like Michael Clarke or Michael Bevan are good examples. Both could have been a pretty good bowlers, we’re unlikely to find a leg-spinner that turns it square but we’ve seen Clarke in both Tests and ODI’s and he can be a handful. If we could harness these bowling talents and make more of our batsmen into batting all-rounders it would be a better solution than picking spinners for the sake of having a spinner.
  
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Brett McKay said | October 13th 2009 @ 7:33am | Report comment

Quite right Freud, we don’t need another generation of robotic, overly technical young players. Phillip Hughes is a case in point – yes, he’s got a few little things to iron out, but we should never force on him (nor expect from him) a textbook-perfect technique. We have to let natural talent and ability develop too, and that’s something else I can see coming out of this competition. They’ll still have all the state structures around them, but their flair and natural games should be allowed to come through.

Again, despite this article focussing on the spin-promotion of the Futures League, that’s not the sole purpose of the comp, and so I wouldn’t say the comp has been tweaked to give them more opportunities. There’s definitely incentive to use spin bowlers, but if the spinners aren’t there to use, then they won’t be. The Futures League revamp is all about developing young talent of all categories.

You mentioned harnessing the talents of young bats – something else I said to my concerned mate yesterday was that I did notice in the scorecards that there looks be a lot of all-rounders coming through: bats who bowl a bit, bowlers making handy runs. So I think this could be happening sort of organically.

Did you know Michael Bevan was a pretty reasonable left-arm quick when he made his first grade debut in Canberra?? Like a lot of young quicks, I believe it was a back injury (something about a bike crash too, I think) that forced the move to spin.

And just on the West Indies and their use of spin over the years (or lack thereof), Trinidad & Tobago took 3 spinners into last night’s CLT20 game in Bangalore, and did quite the job on Somerset. So they’ve got spinners in Caribbean somewhere…

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